Charmcaster
Hope, better known as Charmcaster, is one of the villains in the Ben 10 series and the niece/apprentice of Gwen's nemesis Hex. Like her uncle, she depends on magic to fight. Though like most villains, she hates Ben, but her hatred is mostly turned towards Gwen for their shared affinity in magic, mirroring Ben's and Kevin's rivalry in the original series. In Where the Magic Happens, she briefly became a heroine when she and Gwen fought on the same side together, but her time spent alone in her homeworld afterwards caused her to become corrupted again. After failing to resurrect her father, Charmcaster now struggles to find a purpose in life and now stands as a neutral character. Dwayne McDuffie has revealed that Charmcaster and Hex are humans from an interdimensional world (specifically Yahwahtacsip, referred to as Ledger Domain). Charmcaster's father Spellbinder, was a very powerful magician who was murdered by Adwaita. Appearance In the original series, Charmcaster wore a magenta coat with purple at the ends, underneath she wore purple long boots with black straps around them. She wore and still wears her Magical Charm Bag around her waist. In Alien Force and Ultimate Alien, Charmcaster wears a purple dress with a pink ribbon around her waist and a black crown on her head, in addition to that she wears black fingerless gloves. At the top of her dress, she has a cerise pink gem with a golden border, and she also wears long dark purple tights. In the original series, Charmcaster wore her long silver hair in a low ponytail, with two strands of hair out and light purple and pinkish eyes, along with purple lipstick. In Alien Force and Ultimate Alien she wears her long silver hair laid out that extends to her thighs, orchid eyes, and very dark purple lipstick. She looks slightly thinner, much taller, and her ears are pointier. She is also said to be 'cute' and 'hot' by Kevin and Ben, respectively, and Darkstar calls her 'beautiful'. This shows she is favoured, even among the heroes. Original Series In Charmcaster's debut appearance, Tough Luck, she busts Hex out of prison and assists him in trying to steal the Lost Keystone of Bezel which can re-create the other five charms to greatly strengthen and increase Hex's abilities. She manages to trick Gwen by putting on an act about Hex forcing her to help him, only to swipe the Keystone while hugging Gwen. She then gives Hex the Keystone. In the end it is revealed that Hex needs the Keystone to recreate the five Charms of Bezel, and that she is planning to take their power for herself, but fails, as does Hex. Charmcaster returns in A Change of Face. She attempts a body swap spell with Ben as Stinkfly in Massachusetts, she was hoping to take control of the Omnitrix and combine its powers with her magic in order to become invincible. Her efforts fail; however, as her attempts only end in swapping with Gwen, on her second try she was returned to her normal body while Ben and Gwen are swapped, and the third time resulted in returning Ben and Gwen to their normal bodies. She is arrested at the end of the episode, and her bag is tossed into the harbor. She is last seen in juvie, where she is about to be beaten up by Pinky and Missy who Gwen angered during her stay in Charmcaster's body. Gwen obtains her spell book, and keeps it as a souvenir, eventually learning to use it. Charmcaster makes a cameo appearance at the end of Don't Drink the Water, where she is seen taunting Hex (who has been reduced in age to an infant by the waters of the Fountain of Youth) and saying that she'll be giving the orders now. Charmcaster's final appearance in the original series is in Ben 10 vs. the Negative 10 as part of the Negative 10. Unlike her partners; however, Charmcaster is mainly focused on defeating Gwen (as opposed to Ben like everyone else was). She also is shown to have a small rivalry with fellow Negative 10 member Rojo. Alien Force Charmcaster returns in the episode In Charm's Way, where she sends one of her rock monsters to attack Ben, Kevin and Gwen while the trio were spending the day at the beach, the rock creature appeared to be immune to Gwen's energy attacks and proceeded to oust Kevin. Just as Ben was about to take down the rock monster, a magical portal opens up and sucks it away. It was later shown that Charmcaster was hiding in a nearby cave watching it. After voicing her deep hatred for Gwen and her plan to take something precious from her, since Gwen stole her spell book, she used a spell that transformed her into a beautiful blonde haired teenage girl named 'Caroline' as part of her plan to seduce Kevin. Charmcaster set her plan into motion after saving a child from being killed by a truck, she and Kevin journey to the beach where she revealed a partially false life story while removing the ID mask that concealed his mutant form and clearly growing jealous of Gwen when Kevin mentions "You think you can do magic? She's made of magic". She then kisses him, putting him under a spell and ordered him to bring Gwen to the Planetarium before midnight where she can drain Gwen's magical and Anodite powers. After a skirmish with Ben and Gwen, Kevin was broken free from Charmcaster's spell. After the trio arrives at the Planetarium at Gwen's request, Charmcaster sends her rock monsters to deal with Ben and Kevin while she dealt with Gwen herself. Upon meeting, Charmcaster gloats sarcastically at Gwen's hairdo then engaging her in a short magical duel, in which Gwen was led to stand in the middle of a circle of runes that were placed directly under the sky-panel which opens up, exposing Gwen to the full blaze of the moon light. Charmcaster then drains Gwen of all her magic and transfers it to herself. Confident that she had won, Charmcaster retreats with her two surviving rock minions while Ben and Kevin go to Gwens' aid instead of pursuing her. After a short argument with Gwen, Kevin tricks Charmcaster into meeting him on top of a tall building where he lured her with a lie about his loyalty to Ben and that Gwen still had power left, angering Charmcaster even further. The duo later shows up at Mr. Smoothy where Ben and Gwen are having the restaurant's namesake. After scanning Gwen, Charmcaster realized that Gwen had no power left and that Kevin managed to trick her. She uses her magic to bring a Mr. Smoothy sign to life as well as controlling a parked van to kill Kevin and Ben, while her rock monsters attempted to annihilate Gwen who mocks Charmcaster saying "You're the one who's useless Charmcaster, can't take on one powerless girl?" and proceeds to challenge her to a one-on-one fist fight which Charmcaster nonchalantly turned down, opting to kill Gwen with a bolt of mana. However, Gwen turns the tables on Charmcaster by reciting one of her spells and reabsorbs her stolen Anodite powers from Charmcaster, much to Charmcaster's horror. Gwen overpowers Charmcaster's mystical bolt of magenta-colored mana, and it hits her hand. In a burst of pain, Charmcaster backs down her hand and is hit on the chest. Gwen begins draining Charmcaster's magical powers while Charmcaster attempts to deny about losing them. While Gwen is weakening Charmcaster, Gwen remarks that Charmcaster relies on magic by itself, while magic is only one aspect of Gwen. Powerless, Charmcaster gets help from her rock monsters to make one last stand against Gwen. Charmcaster was finally defeated after Gwen summoned a mystical vortex which sucked her and her rock monsters away. Charmcaster appeared in Time Heals with her uncle Hex. Where her uncle was awakened by a disturbance in their home late at night, only for Charmcaster to convince her uncle to return to bed. The disturbance was actually Gwen, who snuck in to steal one of their books that had a spell that'd allow for her to travel back in time in order to stop Kevin's mutation. When this happened, an alternate timeline was created: one where Hex and Charmcaster ended up ruling the Earth. Because the accident that mutated Kevin never happened, the Kevin of this timeline was weaker, and Ben's Team was unable to defeat Charmcaster and her uncle. Charmcaster managed to murder the Gwen of this timeline and absorb all of her powers, she also forced Kevin to absorb the material of her rock monsters and giving her full control over Kevin. Without his team, Ben was easily defeated by Hex and imprisoned in the dungeons as Spidermonkey. When Gwen freed Ben, Ben fights off Charmcaster, Hex, Kevin and the rock monsters as long as he can so Gwen can repair the damage she had done in the past, presumably dying as a result of this. Ultimate Alien Charmcaster returns in Hit 'Em Where They Live, where she assists Zombozo and Vulkanus in a plot to kidnap Ben's mother. She was defeated by Kevin, who scares her away by almost causing a roller coaster to crash on her (If the episode is played scene by scene, it is shown that Charmcaster got out-of-the-way); Kevin was making sure she was not killed as he had promised Ben and Gwen not to finish off his opponent. In Where the Magic Happens, Charmcaster is brought back to her home, Yahwahtacsip(Ledgerdomain as the natives refer to it) to bring help to Gwen and the team. In this episode much is revealed about Charmcaster's past and her feelings toward Gwen. It was shown that Charmcaster had always dreamed of becoming a great sorceress, saying that she had studied magic her whole life but found it extremely unbelievable that Gwen could just come out of nowhere, steal her spell book and become so strong and powerful and suddenly 'out-magic' her. It is also revealed that when she was a child, her father Spellbinder and her people were at war with Adwaita, the greatest magical, mystic being that has ever lived. Her father helped her and Hex escape safely to Earth, but failed in battle and was murdered by Adwaita. Charmcaster's villainous actions were all to gain more and more power so that she could return to Ledger Domain and defeat Adwaita. Charmcaster moves past her feelings of resentment toward Gwen and actually develops a friendship with her, chiefly due to learning that the two of them are actually stronger and more powerful as a team than individually; her knowledge of magic coupled with Gwen's magical powers. She even ends up putting her life on the line, buying time for the trio to escape, leaving herself behind in Ledger Domain with the hopes of defeating Adwaita at last. In The Enemy of My Frenemy, Charmcaster has become corrupted with power during her time fighting for Ledgerdomain and relapse back into her evil ways. Building a device that drains the souls out of living things, she enacted a plan to drain the lifeforce of her world in order to perform a ritual that will bring her father Spellbinder back to life. Ben, Gwen, and Kevin attempted to stop her, but their souls were sucked out as well. When Spellbinder was resurrected, he reveals that Charmcaster's real name is Hope. Horrified at the lengths his daughter has gone to in order to bring him back, he says he can't stay at the cost of so many souls. Telling his daughter that he loves her, he fades away, making the ritual null and void and returning all souls back to where they belong. Charmcaster breaks down crying, not knowing what to do with her life now. Out of pity, Ben, Gwen, and Kevin agree not to arrest the heartbroken Charmcaster and depart. In Couples Retreat, Hope falls in love with Darkstar when he attempts to get into Ledgerdomain. She supplies him with a lot of mana when they kiss multiple times, and allows him to go back to Earth to take revenge upon "his enemies", not knowing this to be Ben, Gwen and Kevin. She also reveals her true name, Hope, to him. When Ben, Gwen, and Kevin arrive at her castle, she fights Gwen while Ben and Kevin take on Darkstar, and becomes enraged when she learns Darkstar and Gwen once dated. Gwen, concerned about Hope, tries to convince her that Darkstar is merely using her, but Hope seems hopelessly deluded. However, just as Darkstar offers her the chance to team up with him and conquer Earth, she realizes that Gwen may be right and asks Darkstar why he never calls her by her real name, and if he even remembers it. After Darkstar doesn't and guesses that her name is Heather, Hope becomes so enraged that her screams destroyed her castle, then drains Darkstar's powers and banishes him from Ledgerdomain, leaving him at the mercy of Ben, Gwen, and Kevin. Charmcaster is last seen at the ruins of her castle, sadly looking down upon Darkstar's mask. Powers and Abilities Original Series In the original series, like Hex, Charmcaster uses magic, but instead of using a staff, she has a magic bag from which she can draw all manner of magical mystical items, such as magical explosives in shades of glowing purple, throwing purple glowing blades, or even a variety of clay animals which she can magically enlarge and animate to do her bidding. Although small, the bag seems to have something of a pocket dimension inside (basically a magic satchel), allowing Charmcaster to store a wide variety things within it that logically should not fit (at one point, she produces Hex's magical mystical staff, an item that is at least four feet tall). The bag also appears to have some degree of sentience, as it found its way back to Charmcaster under its own power. She is also highly skilled in various magical mystical spells, although it is clear that because of her inexperience, she is not as strong and powerful as her uncle. She also possesses a miniature dark purple and gold-stripped spell book (which ten-year-old Gwen takes as keepsake in the original series episode ''A Change of Face'') hidden in her long-sleeved purple-colored coat instead of her bag. Alien Force/Ultimate Alien In Ben 10: Alien Force, Charmcaster does not use her bag anymore, relying mainly on mana manipulation. However, she is still seen using various spells, including levitation, manipulating mana for lightning-like blasts, telekinesis, mind control, elemental control (water, plants, etc.), altering her appearance, bringing life to inanimate objects, transmogrification, summoning and controlling her rock monsters, teleportation, and opening portals for viewing or transport. She can also summon objects to her hand by teleportation or from her magic bag. She now has a staff that's similar to her uncle's that she can use to emit mana blasts. Unlike Gwen's, Charmcaster's magic has a lightning-like effect and a whiter coloration, while Gwen's is more solid and darker, also instead of creating balls of pure mana for projectiles attack, Charmcaster creates lightning bolts. An interesting fact is that when creating magical attacks the large sphere that forms on her hand is atom shaped (two thin rings can be seen), Also she never used a shield unlike Gwen, mainly because when she attacks her spell will collide with the enemy's attack. In The Enemy of My Frenemy, she took over and rules over the realm of Ledgerdomain. She possessed the Alpha Rune, the most powerful magical artifact ever. With it she was strong enough to defeat Adwaita, Gwen, Kevin and Ben easily, change the true name of Ledgerdomain every few seconds and it also made her capable of calling the Old One to revive her father. While she still has godlike power over the realm in Couples Retreat, she appears to have stopped wearing the Alpha Rune. Appearances Ben 10 *''Tough Luck'' (first appearance) *''A Change of Face'' *''Don't Drink the Water'' (cameo) *''Ben 10 vs. the Negative 10 (Part 1)'' *''Ben 10 vs. the Negative 10 (Part 2)'' Ben 10: Alien Force *''In Charm's Way'' (first re-appearance) *''Time Heals'' Ben 10: Ultimate Alien *''Hit 'Em Where They Live'' (first re-appearance) *''Where the Magic Happens'' *''The Enemy of My Frenemy'' *''Couples Retreat'' *''The Ultimate Enemy: Part 2'' (flashback) Ben 10: Omniverse *''Charmed, I'm Sure'' (first re-appearance) Comics *''Fashion Victim'' Video Games *''Ben 10 Alien Force: Vilgax Attacks'' *''Ben 10 Alien Force: The Rise of Hex'' Naming and Translations Trivia *Charmcaster is the only villain that fought in Mr. Smoothy without destroying it. *Charmcaster is shown to be in possession of Hex's staff. As stated in the original series, only a master magician can use it. Since Charmcaster was able to do so, it implies that she has become a master magician since her appearance in Ben 10: Alien Force. *Charmcaster's original design, as seen on the "Ben 10 Complete Third Season" DVD, looked just like the one that was actually used except her coat was red instead of purple, her hair black instead of white, and with paintings on her face that made her resemble Hex. *Charmcaster is the only villain to target Gwen for revenge throughout the series (every other villain targets Ben). See Also */Gallery/ *Charmcaster's Stone Creatures *Charmcaster's Bag *Gwen's Spellbook *Charmcaster's Castle